Stardust
by Painapurru
Summary: The Wizard has been living the same way for years now, hidden away studying the stars and being dismissed as a fortuneteller. But if one thing really bothers him it's his magic being doubted, and Angela does just that when she comes to ask him for help. One tumultuous meeting leads to another and the Wizard starts to want to know a thing or two about this girl.
1. Doubt

I'd been alone for a very long time when she arrived on the island it seemed. It had been many years since I'd been on speaking terms with the Witch Princess and many years before that even that my Master had passed on to the next realm. The world had ceased to interest me and I was absorbed with worlds beyond ours, with the stars…

The sky was the object of my fascination during the hours of darkness and books and potions filled my mornings. Occasionally villagers came to see me, beseeching me for a remedy or to gaze into the heart of the one that they desired. I found this troublesome, that they would trouble a great wizard such as myself with trivial matters such as fortune telling. Did they think that was all I was capable of? In my younger years I would have perhaps been upset by the assumption that I was so weak at magic. I would have performed feats such as levitation, telekinesis, altering the weather, or starting fires with my bare hands. But I was an old man now – though I didn't look it, older than any other human on the island – and their underestimation of my power did nothing more than tire me. So I would fill my evenings, lock my doors through the mornings, and leave a few hours in the afternoon open to whoever might seek my help. I was, almost entirely, absorbed by my musings.

Some time after the new girl, Angela as I had gathered, moved onto the island she came to see me. For a reason that I cannot discern I felt a little irritated when it turned out that she had only come to ask me for help, just like all the others. Perhaps it was because in lazily viewing my crystal ball I had seen that she took time out of her day to meet and even visit every other villager. Yet again, I supposed that I wasn't quite a villager. Angela, as it were, needed my help in finding the Witch Princess. There was something about the island's bells mixed in to her pleading, the green one to be exact. I sighed and turned my head to gaze deeply into the text that I had been reading at the time while she continued rambling on.

"You went to the Witch's house… Was there… a frog?..." I said in a voice that was dusty with time unused. I had been with the With Princess at the time that it had happened. The Harvest Goddess was losing power, and quickly. The people of the island had forgotten about her it seemed, and her waning power was only noticed by us magical being. The Goddess was too weak at this point to revive herself or even to talk to us and the Witch Princess thought that she could cast a spell to bolster the power of the Goddess. Naturally I warned her that such a maneuver was destined to fail or worse, backfire. But the Witch Princess, being the haughty little thing that she'd always been, denied that such a thing could happen. Lo and behold, she'd been transformed into a frog and hopped sullenly home before she even finished the incantation. I'd returned to my home, knowing full well that there was nothing I could do for the goddess and being just the slightest bit happy that the Witch would be trapped as a frog for a while.

"Oh, um, yes, there was a frog… A rather noisy one actually…" Angela said, slightly flustered now. She seemed to be wondering why I wasn't more concerned I assumed. My comment about the frog also seemed to have confused her slightly.

"Well… That would be the Witch Princess… I'll need to make a potion… if you want her to be restored to her human form…" I said tiredly, rubbing my eye with my free hand and looking down at her.

"How long will that take!" Angela interjected, looking a little worried now. I sighed patiently and thought over my options. I didn't really want to bring the Witch back, she was such a pain, but Angela seemed desperate to get the bell. From what I had seen through my crystal ball Angela needed to ring the bells with the Harvest Sprites in order to return some of the Harvest Goddess's power. Reviving the Goddess was an honorable cause, one that perhaps only Angela could do. I had told the truth when I told Angela that this would require a potion. Using an incantation instead would be more dangerous, not to mention require magical drawings all over the Witch's floor, which she would no doubt not appreciate.

"The potion…" I said slowly, still thinking, "will require some rather rare ingredients… I don't have time to search for them myself… You'll have to get them for me… I'll need… Good Cornmeal… Perfect Butter… and a Hibiscus flower…" Angela seemed a little taken aback at this, so I looked into her eyes and continued. "Did you expect that I would simply whip up a potion for you?... I'm a busy man… Bring me the ingredients and I will make the potion… I have many things to do in the meantime… Stars to search… Books to read…" After that I started to pretend to ignore her, still standing in front of her but looking back down into my book, but she didn't move for a little while. Her aura felt somewhat irritated now.

"What a hassle…" She muttered under her breath, but I heard her clearly. I peered at her from the corner of my eye; she furrowed her brows then put her hand on her hip while she surveyed my home quickly. The edge of her mouth twitched as she took note of each of my eccentricities, such as the giant telescope on the upper level of my home, the dusty shelves of books, various lists and diagrams tacked to my walls, and the stack of dirty coffee cups that had been pushed onto the corner of my desk. Eventually her eyes landed back on me, looking my choice in appearance up and down. Amusement lit her eyes as she took in my pointed boots, purple robe, and the single braid in my gray hair.

The way she had looked about my room had not bothered me but this dismissal of my attire and hair frustrated me like nothing else. Here was this girl with almost boyishly short hair, light skin which she had allowed to become burnt around the edges, and dirty patched clothes and she dared to look down upon the face of a wizard? Just to see what she would do I turned my head more towards her and put my right hand up to casually brush the hair of my face. Suddenly she couldn't stop staring, a look of intrigue delicately taking up its place on her face as she took in my appearance. My right eye was different than my left, the color of candle light rather than that of green moss. A magical tattoo, given to me by my Master, also held a proud place on the right side of my face. Gracing my high cheekbone and standing out against my dark tan skin was the white marking, a single stripe with three triangles tucked beneath it.

"I don't normally have visitors for the sake of having visitors…" I said softly, the corner of my mouth turning down as my eyes connected with Angela's more strongly. She blushed a little bit at having been called out on still being in my house. "Do you… need something else?" I offered.

"Oh! No! I couldn't possibly ask for anything else. Especially since you just said you'd help me with Witch and everything!" She rushed to say, taking half a step back with one foot.

"Are you sure?..." I continued, shaking my hair back into my face little more. "Most people ask me to look into the hearts of someone that they like… Or perhaps mix up a simple remedy for one thing or another… Just easy things…" At this point I just sincerely wanted to know why it was that she continued to linger rather than choosing to dismiss herself from my presence.

"No… I have no hearts to look into just yet and you certainly couldn't make a remedy for the list of rare ingredients you just gave me to find…" Angela replied in an exhausted voice.

"I see… Well… Good luck with the rest of your day then." I said calmly, though in reality I was irate to have learned nothing more. I nodded my head at Angela and snapped my book closed, moving to set it on my desk and pick up another. In my preoccupied state the book pushed one of the coffee mugs off of my desk and Angela let out a little bit of a squeak just as I threw out my hand and muttered a spell, barely catching the mug in a greenish glow, saving it from shattering on the floor.

"So you _can_ do magic!" She exclaimed in the most surprised voice I'd heard from anyone in a while.

I waved my hand to coax the mug back onto the desk and turned around to look at Angela sternly. "Of course I can do magic you idiot… Why in hell else would I waste my time learning all of the things I do? Not to mention there isn't really any other good explanation for being able to spy on the hearts of others or looking hundreds of years younger than I am…" I said, almost angry at this point. It was a bit unbelievable to me that she would doubt that I could do magic, that doubt was why she had lingered. Not many things caused an emotional response with me anyone, years of being alone had cured me of that, but underestimation of my magical prowess really irritated me. I had grown numb to the people of Castanet treating me as a common fortune teller, but the new girl doubting that I could even do magic at all was a different offense altogether.

"I… I'm sorry… I'll just go now…" Angela said timidly, almost sadly, inching towards the door.

"If that was really what you'd wanted to know. You could have asked." I said, my first truly firm statement of her visit. As she left I threw another phrase towards her, this one dripping with sarcasm in a way I'd almost forgotten I could manage "Please come again." Once the door had shut and her steps had faded away I huffed out a sigh and fell back onto my bed, my hands clutching the sides of my head as I stared up at my ceiling.

No one ever really noticed it, but I had mapped out the stars on ceiling using a gentle sort of magic. The paintings weren't in extreme depth, but they did to a degree truthfully show the night sky, complete with shifting markings showing many of the constellations. I stared up into them, allowing my thoughts to drift away from the girl who had so stirred up my emotions in a single visit. Solitude was not always as rewarding as interaction, but it was certainly easier… I traced the littler dipper and big dipper with my eyes, and then moved over to Orion's belt…

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**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially praise or constructive criticism, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, there should be updates at least every two weeks until the fall semester starts assuming that I don't get taken away by some other activity. Thank you for reading.


	2. Bitter

When I woke the next day it was mid-afternoon. This was understandable because I hadn't slept for several days prior and had not fallen into sleep until it was nearly morning. I shifted my legs out of bed and my bare feet hit the cold floor. Yawning loudly, I stood from the bed and cracked my back, the cold air of the room hit the bare skin on my chest and I remembered that I hadn't bothered to do anything but strip down to boxers before crashing onto my mattress. I reached back blindly onto my bed and tore the quilt from it to wrap around my shoulders before kicking the dirty clothes from the day before into the corner. Shuffling my feet, I made my way over to my desk and noted that I had remembered to clean up the coffee mugs. I extended my hand to call one from the cabinet, but stopped myself before I actually did since I remembered that I was, in fact, all out of coffee beans. Grumbling now, I moved over to my dresser to find a clean pair of clothes to wear for my coffee trip.

In another ten minutes I had arranged myself in the same style black shirt as I always wore, a pair of khaki pants with a little less embellishment than usual, and my customary pointed boots. Just before I stepped out the door I ran my fingers through my hair to calm my bedhead, then I was off. It was, as I had idiotically neglected to notice, raining. A temperamental spring shower, as it were, so I muttered a spell to keep me dry before I stepped out from under my awning, then walked confidently through the lonely drizzle to the Ocarina Inn.

"Afternoon, Wizard." The man behind the long counter said with a nod. I inclined my head towards him and then moved to take a seat at an unoccupied table in the corner. Mere moments later Maya, the source of all chaos within the walls of the inn, came skipping over to take my order.

"I'll have coffee, black, and a piece of toast." I said simply, not even bothering to look at Maya, just leaning back in my chair.

"Oky doky Mister Wizard!" She said loudly, and sort of twirled before going back to the kitchen to fill my order. I prayed to the Goddess that Colleen or Yolanda prepared my food and not that dolt… Yolanda could make toast and brew coffee in her sleep, Maya on the other hand had managed to burn my coffee multiple times in the past… I was lucky enough to have my food served in good condition within the next few minutes. The hot coffee nearly seared my tongue when I took the first sip, a feeling that I had grown used to over years of taking caffeine over sleep. Sipping coffee and picking at a piece of toast was most often how I started my days.

I looked around the inn from my corner. Colleen and Yolanda were talking quietly in the kitchen, Jake was sitting behind the counter reading a book, and Maya was making a bit of a commotion over a peachy haired boy I knew to be named Chase. Maya was infatuated with Chase, perhaps even in love. She came to me every now and again asking me to tell her how to get to Chase's heart. The answer was always things she couldn't obtain like oranges out of season or a cake she couldn't possibly hope to cook correctly. However, every single time I told her what he wanted she would try her hardest to get it for him; she wanted nothing but to be liked by him. Even through all of her attempts though, Chase saw her as nothing more than an annoyance, a silly girl who couldn't cook worth and damn, he thought himself above her. I saw their hearts through my crystal ball though; I knew that if no one interfered the two would end up together eventually. Maya would be sweet and doting and Chase would make her food that would excite her every time, they would have a long and healthy relationship together.

Just then Angela came breezing through the door, soaking wet from the drizzle but with a big smile on her face. She rushed right over to Maya and Chase, who instantly stopped arguing to converse with her. I found myself intrigued as I drank my coffee and watched them; it was as though Angela had somehow brought a little more light into the room with her dripping appearance. People were not my specialty. Though I knew many things about the people in the town I never knew what to expect from them, understanding of short term emotions escaped me and finesse in handling interactions with them was beyond me. However, every moment that I spent watching them was intriguing to me and it always left me with more questions than answers.

Angela was laughing now, and fluffed up her hair to the amusement of her two ginger friends. I finished off my toast and continued to watch them, wondering what had made the three a compatible mix. They only continued to chat for a few moments longer before Colleen called Maya over and told her to refill my coffee though. Chase then excused himself, saying something about not being able to be late for work at the bar, and Angela realized that I was sitting in the corner. Maya poured the coffee into my mug with a wide grin then went back to the kitchen to talk with her mother and grandmother, Angela came over to me with a somewhat confused expression.

"I've never seen you in here before…" Angela trailed off without actually asking a question. I took a drink of my coffee and looked at her silently, wondering if she would continue to speak. She did. "I mean. I'd never actually spoken to you before yesterday. Or seen you… But I come here every day and I've never run into you…" She seemed to be floundering a bit, unable to explain not having interacted with me before the previous day. I had seen her to be quite a social creature, so I assumed that was the source of her discomfort, since she went out of her way to talk to everyone.

"I don't often leave my home… When I do… Well it is most commonly in the youngest hours of the morning… To look into the sky while the rest of the world sleeps…" I said with a faint smile as I thought about the stars. Many things in this world were beautiful, but I considered the stars to perhaps be the most striking. I wondered momentarily how Angela felt about the stars, and then I found myself wondering why I even cared.

"Well why are you here today then? Since it obviously isn't to socialize… Certainly you could get a cup of coffee and piece of toast at home." She said, eyeing my half-finished piece of toast.

"I'm out of coffee beans." I stated frankly. "And I need coffee to start my day properly."

"You're starting your day at 3:30?..." She said with a little bit of a confused look, perhaps even incredulously.

"I've gotten 8 hours of sleep in the last week. I will start my day whenever I see fit. My obligations follow no time constraint." I said with a small smirk and a quirk of my brow. Taking another drink of my coffee, I observed Angela's reaction. Surprisingly enough, she chose to sit down in the chair across from me.

"I wish I had that luxury." She said with a sigh, setting her elbow on the table and propping her head up with her hand. Her clothes seemed to be nearly dry at this point. "I have to wake up at the crack of dawn every morning just to drag myself through the same set of farm chores. There's a little bit of flexibility with what I do with the rest of my day, but now I have to channel most of my efforts towards getting the ingredients for your potion."

"Ah… Yes… The potion… It will take some time to get the ingredients, I'm sure… Good luck." I said calmly. I wasn't sure how far Angela had looked into the list of ingredients I'd given her, but she wouldn't even be able to grow corn until the summertime, and it was only late spring. If she thought that she was going to finish this task quickly, then she had severely underestimated the challenge that I had given her.

"Thanks… So, what are you doing for the rest of your day?..." She asked tentatively.

I stared at her for a moment, thinking about my options in this situation. Which responses would drive her away, which would only intrigue her more? I didn't know much about socializing, but I did enjoy experimenting. My eventual response was to tell the truth. "Well… I'll probably finish my coffee… Then go home to wait for whoever might need my talents… After that I'll order some new coffee beans… Search the stars… Do a bit of research… The usual…"

Angela looked at me for a moment before responding. "That's what you always do?... Alone?"

My brows furrowed together and I looked Angela in the eye. "Well… Of course… What else would I do?..."

"I – I don't know! Go out and talk to people!" She said, her cheeks turning a bright pink. I looked at her for another moment, letting the silence drag out and my brain to process this proposal. Perhaps this was uncomfortable for her, but silence was what I normally had to listen to so it was somewhat comforting.

"People… Aren't exactly accepting of me… I'm strange to them… And they are strange to me… Interacting is… difficult… It's lonely… But maybe it's better that way…" I said slowly, rubbing my eyes and finishing off my cup of coffee. I didn't really have a problem talking to people, but it wasn't easy to relate to them anymore. In my years of solitude the understanding of others that I used to have had faded, I was sluggish and awkward compared to the now commonly fast paced conversations held by everyone else. Angela didn't respond, so I stood from the table and left my payment next to my half-finished plate of toast.

"Would you mind if I came to see you?..." She said quietly. I didn't turn to answer her, but I stopped and thought it over for a second. "Just to say hello on the afternoons… You could use some interaction outside of people asking you favors."

"That… I would not mind…" I replied, and then walked out of the door. Had I looked back, I would have seen that she smiled at me as I left.

During my late afternoon breakfast at the inn the drizzle had stopped and the sun had started to shine, though there were still a few puddles in the low spots of the pavement. I turned my face to the sky and closed my eyes, allowing the sun to warm my face before I continued walking up and around the corner to my home. Though I did enjoy the sunlight my tanned skin was a byproduct of my breeding, not my activities, and I sort of preferred it that way. The daytime had many advantages, but the night was a vessel for the things I loved most about living.

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**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, there should be updates at least every two weeks until the fall semester starts assuming that I don't get taken away by some other activity. Thank you for reading.


	3. Rejection

The next day Angela did come to visit me but it wasn't until several hours after when I had expected to see her. The sun had set about an hour before she came stumbling through my door, long past the "afternoon" she had led me to believe she would arrive during. "Angela… Hello…" I said quietly, not even looking up from the diagram I was working on, it was a theory about a new ritual circle to channel the world's energies into crystals to use for spell casting.

"Hello Wizard." She said breathlessly. I wondered if she had been running. "Sorry to come so late."

"It's not a problem… I was just doing some research…" I replied, adding a few final strokes to the circle prototype and jotting down a few notes before closing my books and standing from my desk to turn and look at Angela. My home was dim, with just a few candles burning brightly, but the flickering of the flames graced Angela's flushed features in a way I hadn't quite expected. My head unconsciously tilted to the side as I took in her appearance. Her cheeks were a bit pink, presumably from running, her brown hair was sticking out in all directions and she wore a clean green tunic shirt with jeans and a pair of work boots. I had lusted after many women in my lifetime and had experienced the touch of women many times more beautiful than Angela, but at that moment she was as stunning as any other woman I had ever seen. I blinked my eyes a few times to clear my head and return her to her standard average appearance before I continued speaking. "I would offer you coffee… But I still don't have any beans… Tea perhaps?..."

"Tea sounds nice." Angela said with a smile and I nodded, moving over to my cabinet to retrieve two mugs. There was a pot of tea sitting on my desk, kept warm with magic, and I carefully poured the steaming liquid into the mugs before handing one to Angela. She took a careful sip and then smiled. "Thank you, this is the best tea I've had in a long time." I smiled back at her but I wasn't quite sure why. I took a sip of my own tea and walked over to the stairs that went up to my telescope and sat on the bottom step, stretching my legs out in front of me and leaning back on the upper steps. Angela came over and joined me, putting her elbows on her knees and gazing around my room.

I stared up at the constellations dancing on my ceiling and wondered what I should say to Angela, wondered how normal guys would handle the situation. I suppose I am not a normal guy though, I'm just an old man blessed with the body of a young one. So I chose to say nothing, just to drink my tea and enjoy the silence sitting next to this young girl.

Angela broke the silence not long after, as I had assumed she would. She turned to see me staring up at the ceiling and likewise tilted her head to see what I was looking at. A little gasp escaped from between her lips as her eyes were lit up by my artificial star-scape. "How did I not notice this before.?.." She murmured, watching as the constellations shifted.

"Do you… often look at the high ceilings of strangers on your first visit?... Most people don't notice it…" I said calmly, sipping my tea. I watched her as she stared at the ceiling, her mouth hanging just slightly open and her neck craned back so she could take in as much as possible. A smile crept on to my face; her fascination was that of a child.

"Wizard?" She said, her voice had a hint of amazement in it, "Why do you love the stars so much?"

I had to think for a moment before responding to this question. It was something I myself had taken many years to understand and answering it simply was not an easy thing to do. "Well… They are one of the most beautiful things… Beyond my reach and filled with energy… Observing the stars can tell one many things about our world… Zodiacs, stories of the gods, and fortune telling all have ties to those worlds beyond ours…" I trailed on, unable to fully explain the fascination I had come to have with the night sky.

"I see." Angela replied assuredly. "I wish I had a fascination like that."

"With time comes everything… One day, perhaps many years from now, you will find that there are things you love the way that I love stars…" I said with the voice of an old man, finishing my cup of tea and standing from the stairs to put the dirty glass on my desk with the rest which had begun to accumulate again.

"Wizard, how old are you?" Angela asked, her voice quivering slightly. Was she afraid to ask? I took a moment to think about the best way to respond to her question.

"I… I don't remember." I said, looking down at her with my brows furrowed a little. It was the truth of course; after Master passed away I no longer had someone that cared enough to celebrate the passing of years with me. Angela looked a little confused and I realized that I needed to say something that would make a point about how old I really was. "I was hundreds of years old when I came to Castanet… And when I came to the island, I remember that the Goddess was singing…" I said, the corner of my mouth turning down as I moved past Angela and up the stairs to my telescope. After a certain age one realizes that a year is no longer something large enough to gauge time with. Sometime after my 500th year I started to gauge events relatively to each other by decades and centuries rather than singe years…

Angela came up the stairs slowly to see me gazing through my telescope with a rather blank expression. "That's… Incredible." She said finally. "I can't even imagine living that many years… I'm only in my twenties now…" I stepped away from my telescope to look at Angela. She was staring at her feet and I almost felt… bad? I wasn't sure how to explain the emotion.

"Are you… Do I… Make you feel young?..." I asked, confused with the situation.

Angela laughed and looked at me with eyes that seemed to be hiding something. "Of course you make me feel young! You're hundreds, maybe even a thousand, of years older than I am! You talk about stars and magic with such passion and with the mannerism of an old man and you only look to be in your mid-twenties!"

I frowned deeply. Frustration had come easily to me when she had upset me the first time, but this was something different. "Is it… bad?..." I asked, feeling a bit of a pain in my chest. In the future I might have identified this emotion as rejection or longing, but at the time I was nothing but confused and caught off guard by how much her comments stung me.

"Yes!" Angela said firmly, and then her expression faltered when she saw my frown and the confusion in my heterochromatic eyes. "I – I mean…" She trailed off, her lips sort of pouting.

"If that's how you feel… Well I don't see how that's going to change…" I said with a deep sigh, turning back to my telescope and almost hoping that she would leave so that I could think properly in silence.

"I'm sorry… I just… Was caught off guard by you being that old… I knew you were older than you looked, but I wasn't expecting…" Angela said, almost pleading with me. Silence closed in and there was only the sound of our breathing for a while, and I took that time to think.

When I had finally arranged a response to Angela I was almost surprised that she was even still there. "I am and old man by most standards, but I am not truly an old man on the inside. My life has been long but I expect it to last much longer. I have no friends but I find purpose when I look to the stars…" I said softly. "When you said that you would like to visit me I thought that perhaps you would provide a break to my routine, but I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to allow you to frivolously visit if you only intend to hurt my feelings when I answer your questions…"

"I didn't mean to…" Angela said in a choked voice. I stared at her with a blank expression, waiting to see what she would do next. She turned her purple-brown eyes down into the remainders of her cup of tea and exhaled heavily. When she looked back to my eyes her expression seemed genuinely hurt by my harsh words, but I couldn't bring myself to respond. "I'm sorry. I guess I'll just go…" Almost immediately she had turned and started back down the stairs. She left her mug on the table where I had left mine and walked right out the door.

Once she had left I couldn't help but wonder if I had messed up, if I had gone too far being that blunt with her. I sat down directly where I was standing and put my head in my hands. Angela was far from perfect but she had been kind enough to come see me purely because she thought it would be good for me, she had come initially asking me for help but she hadn't continued to pester me with requests like the others… I lay down on the floor then, staring up at my dancing ceiling and contemplating my position.

Did I need to forgive her or did she need to forgive me? Which of us was in the wrong? My head ached as I further explored the predicament. Perhaps I just wasn't cut out to have friends. Tears of frustration and hurt budded at the edges of my eyes as fell into sleep again for the first time in over 24 hours.

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**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, there should be updates at least every two weeks until the fall semester starts assuming that I don't get taken away by some other activity. Thank you for reading.


	4. Crystal

Bright rays of sunlight touched my eyes the next morning, waking me from a night of uncomfortable slumber on the floor next to my telescope. I stood and cracked my sore back before looking down at my wrinkled appearance and frowning, I would have to wash clothes, I was out. Like the old man I felt like in that moment I moved slowly down the stairs and gathered my clothes, tossing them into a cloth sack. Before I left I pulled out my "reserve" clothes and put them on, then I strode out the door, my laundry bag over my shoulder, to ask my customary favor.

Colleen smiled at me as I came through the door of the Ocarina Inn; the clothes I was wearing meant one thing and one thing only: laundry day. The dainty woman took the full sack from me and went to the back room where she did laundry, telling Yolanda to get me some coffee as she went. I sat down in the same corner as before and leaned back in my chair as Yolanda brought my coffee over, she asked if I wanted anything else so I went ahead and asked for toast again. The wallpaper kept me company as I took in the early morning routine of the Inn, it wasn't often that I was here before midday and I was almost certain that I had arrived today before they were actually open. Jake was straightening papers with little reading glasses perched on his nose at his end of the room and in the kitchen Maya and Yolanda were involved in what seemed to be a cooking lesson. I sipped my hot coffee, almost pleased with the feeling of my tongue very nearly being burned by the bitter liquid.

Angela walked through the door and I froze, my eyes locked onto her as she walked over to Maya and Yolanda. Anxiously, I took another sip from my coffee as she talked with them, making comments on Maya's cooking. I wondered if she was still upset. Then she turned around and the smile dropped from her face as she took in the sight of me sitting in the corner again. I cursed myself for staying out dressed the way I was and crossed my bare arms as I turned my face away from her. The clothes I was wearing weren't so bad but they certainly weren't my style: a black tank top and a pair of ripped jeans. I hadn't been watching long enough to see the smirk that crept its way onto her face.

Angela came over to me with the smirk on her face and I unfolded my arms to take a sip of my coffee, my face still turned to the side. "Hey, Wizard" she said calmly, I nodded to acknowledge her and she sat down across from me. "Nice clothes." My head snapped to the side and I saw that she had a full blown smile on her face now. I scowled.

"Laundry day…" I muttered, and took a bite of the toast I had been ignoring.

"I think it's a nice change from the high necks and long sleeves." Angela said cheerfully. I looked up at her and she sort of gasped before twisting around to dig in her bag for something. I sighed and put my elbow on the table, resting my head in my hand, as she continued to search fruitlessly. "Aha!" She said at long last and pulled a little burlap sack out of her bag and put it on the table.

"Sh-shining coffee beans?" I said in a somewhat flabbergasted tone as I investigated the bag. These were of the highest quality, a luxury I seldom had the funds to obtain for myself. Angela looked at me and smiled gently.

"I'm sorry about being so callous. Normally I'm a lot better with people than I have been with you…" Angela said sheepishly and I sighed.

"I should be the one saying sorry... My reaction was childish and emotional… I had no reason to be so harsh." I said slowly, running my hand through my hair as I spoke.

"Your reaction wasn't childish, it was human." Angela said calmly and stood from the table. "But thank you. Enjoy the coffee beans." It was all I could do to murmur a similar thanks as she breezed out the door of the Inn. When I turned back to my toast and coffee I found myself almost lonely. Though we had clashed Angela had brought a refreshing break to the tedium of my daily routines. I hoped warily that she would visit me again, though I had a healthy doubt that it would happen. I stayed at the Inn until Colleen finished my laundry and then went back home to return to my studies.

* * *

When the sun rose the next morning to me still working at my desk with deep dark circles beneath my eyes my hopes of Angela visiting had faded entirely. My order of coffee beans had arrived later the previous afternoon and I had set them aside in favor of the high quality beans that Angela had given, but once I found myself brewing them I felt almost bitter at the thought that she was the one who had given them to me. Certainly I owed her something; beans of this caliber didn't come free of charge. I rubbed my eyes and drank deeply from the delicious coffee as I moved over to the crystal ball that sat in the center of the room. I held my hand above it and the insides started to fog as I wondered what to look for.

* * *

Angela was working on her farm, trying to finish the day's work as early as possible. The chickens were fed and the eggs had been collected, her little black cow, Bonnie, had been milked and brushed, the field had been weeded, and she was carefully watering the rows of lettuce and potatoes. Her mind lingered on the things she still had to do, the many goals she had yet to meet. There must have been a million of them. Go to the ranch and buy a duckling, grow lettuce as a favor to Ruth, find time to search the Watery Cave for a black pearl, go fishing, patch that damn leak in her watering can, figure out what the trees that take up half her field were even good for, visit everyone, bring Bo lunch so the railway can get fixed, and clean her house for the first time since she moved to the island. If there was a single thing that she desperately wanted it was a few more rainy days so that she wouldn't have to waist an hour watering the plants and could get something done for once.

The Wizard smiled inwardly. Bringing a gentle drizzle was a small feat, and more than enough to repay Angela. Though she wouldn't know it, the blessed rain that came for the next two days was his doing, and it was more than enough in his mind to repay her for the coffee beans, even if she didn't know that he caused it. He returned to his studies with a clear mind and good coffee.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, there should be updates at least every two weeks until the fall semester starts assuming that I don't get taken away by some other activity. Thank you for reading.

So sorry for the long delay until this update! Got busy with friends, holidays, birthdays, summer homework, and a million other things it feels like. I hope you like the chapter!


	5. Hate

It was the beginning of summer before Angela came to visit me again. During the month or more that that added up to I was preoccupied with my studies again, only rarely did I get interrupted by people coming to visit me asking for fortunes. I had made progress on infusing the concentration crystals with energy from the environment but it was still imperfect, my first attempts had resulted in the crystals cracking or new imperfections arising in the stones, a costly mistake.

When Angela came through the door I was face down in a book on my desk, passed out after a little over three days without sleep, but the jingle of the bell on the hinge roused me. I rubbed my eyes and turned to look at her groggily and she blushed at having woken me up. "Yes?" I said raspily, with one eye still covered as I rubbed the sleep out of it with the back of my hand. It was admittedly a bit strange to be woken from my impromptu nap by her when we hadn't spoken in so long.

"Um… I uh… brought the ingredients." Angela said digging about her bag excitedly and pulling out all the things I had asked for. "I just got back from the island for the hibiscus flower and I churned the butter this morning so I thought I'd go ahead and bring everything while it was still fresh." She said, excitedly setting the flower, carefully encased in a little box, the butter, and a bag of cornmeal on my desk. "So how long is this going to take?" Angela finished with a big smile.

"Shouldn't take long…" I said and reached over to the coffee I had brewed just before falling asleep, it lit up with a slight glow as I muttered a spell to reheat it. I took a sip of the coffee, steaming at that point, and pushed my work to one side of my desk to make room for brewing the potion. Angela came up behind my chair to watch over my shoulder, which was somewhat unnerving as I had been working in complete solitude for many years but I did my best to ignore her. I called a cauldron and several other ingredients from the other side of the room and riffled through my notes until I found the recipe I'd made for the potion a while ago. In my tired state I followed my instructions mindlessly, ingredients and incantations pouring in to the cauldron at a rapid pace while I stirred the pot and heated it with magic. And then, within minutes, the potion was finished and poured into a small crystal bottle.

"Wow." Angela said with an almost confused look on her face. "That was… very fast!"

"Well... Yes… Practiced hands…" I said and put the bottle into the pocket of my pants before standing up and straightening the wrinkles out of my robe with some minor magic. "Okay. Let's go…" Angela smiled and nodded in response, leading the way out of my house.

The walk to the forest and then to the Witch Princess's house was a long one. Being as tall as I was, taller than all but one or two of the other men on the island, my stride was long and thus fast and I considered slowing down for her benefit but Angela did alright keeping up with me. While we walked we didn't talk much. Angela said a thing or two about the weather and the state of her farm but I didn't pay it much attention aside from polite nods, the dark circles under my eyes attested well enough to the fact that I was severely sleep deprived at the time. When we arrived in the forest though, and I took the lead, I couldn't help but put out a word of warning. "Be careful coming into the forest… Some people say the Witch Princess is the most dangerous thing… Really, it's getting lost… So… At least not alone…"

Angela laughed a little bit when I said that, and I frowned because my warning was completely serious. Getting lost in the Fugue Forest could end with serious illness from eating something poisonous or extreme fatigue, it wasn't a joking matter to enter the forest without some sort of guidance. "I never venture far except for the time I tried to visit the Witch. Don't be such a worry wart!" She smiled at me, but I was still a little put off, plenty of people had gotten lost in the forest and the attitude that it wouldn't happen to her wasn't a healthy one. The atmosphere returned to silence as we entered the Witch's home.

Angela was talking but I wasn't hearing her, I simply nodded before taking the crystal bottle out of my pocket and moving over to the frog that was on the table making quite a raucous. I poured the potion onto the Witch-frog and stepped back. The incantations flooded into my mind and the room lit up a little bit, the area around me brightened with magic as did the potion and then the Witch herself as the effect of her failed spell were reversed.

When the moment of magic was finished the Witch Princess was back to being exactly as she was before and I was back to wondering why I'd even helped Angela return such an annoying person to her previous state. "YES! I'm _finally_ back to normal!" She exclaimed with a big smile, but it wasn't long before she'd turned back to me with all of her foot-stamping-Witch-Princess-fury. "What the heck took you long!" The Witch practically shouted in my face as Angela stood by with a rather anxious mannerism about her. "I was stuck as a frog for FOREVER! I had to eat flies! And I was slimy! It was AWFUL! "

It took a deep breath and a calming exhale to reply to her without shouting myself. "I warned you not to use that spell…"

Seconds after the words left my mouth I knew it was the wrong thing to say, but I didn't much care. The Witch hit an all new level of irritation at this point, positively fuming now. "So you left me as a frog to teach me a lesson! That's just CRUEL!"

I thought on that for a moment, but decided that whatever the Witch thought really had no impact on me, she was a childish and self-centered being who hadn't truly had any sort of regard for me in too many years to count. I spoke in as cool a voice as ever. "Well, did it work?"

The Witch entirely blew her top and Angela was backing further away at this point, looking somewhat terrified. "ARGH! You make me so mad!" She shouted furiously, but then her rage simmered down to something a little more threatening. "I hate you. Get out." The Witch finished with a big huff and crossed her arms.

I resisted the urge to say something of a similar nature back instead electing to murmer something along the lines of "Never a more passionate woman have I met" before bowing deeply to the Witch Princess and taking my leave. Angela followed me out of the house, eyeing the Witch warily as she did. When we'd gotten outside I gave Angela a long look and let the silence sink in. "Well, looks like we're done here. See you later." I said calmly and inclined my head to Angela before walking past her and back into the forest, leaving her in front of the Witch's house to do whatever she pleased.

On the walk home I assured myself that I must have done the right thing in reviving the Witch since Angela needed her help and the Witch herself certainly needed to get back to her proper self eventually. But being told that I was hated wasn't exactly the best of the thanks… My emotional state was very nearly sulky as I observed the various plants and fungi along the path as I wearily weaved my through the forest. The Witch couldn't possibly have really meant that she hated me after all… Disliked me certainly, but she couldn't actually hate me…

In our younger years, perhaps hundreds of years ago, when my hair had still been a rich black and hers still the most youthful and gorgeous sort of bright blonde, we had learned magic under the same master. We had grown close during sleepless nights of studying and bonded over cauldrons of putrid smelling potions and chalk casting circles drawn on Master's floor. What we had wasn't perfect and we had a nasty habit of competing with each other, picking out our faults, and finding each other generally annoying, but it had developed into a sort of love. In those days I had spoken much more. However, with time came distance and with maturing came betrayal in its many forms. Things that had seemed like wonderful ideas in the heat of the moment came to be she and I's greatest regrets, sharing our names with each other the foremost among them. When the entire world went south and we went our different directions we came to cope in very different ways. The Witch Princess became even more loud and haughty, she was distrustful of everyone and everything and didn't want to be bothered at all, and she retreated into her own little world. I, on the other hand, became much more quiet than I had been in those youngest years, I allowed myself to blend in and become socially invisible against the backdrop that was the civilized world knowing full well that the small annoyances of the occasional visit would never turn into the threats that both of us were trying to avoid. Our lack of tolerance for each other was, just maybe, most deeply rooted in that we came to understand that we were dangerous to each other.

Arriving at my home brought a bitter end to my reverie, the visit with the Witch having revived in my all of the loathing for what I'd become over the years. I'd began as such a bright child and had such great things ahead of me but I'd taken a path that changed all of that. I finished my schooling with Master along with the Witch and after his passing everything changed. There was no longer anything holding the Witch and I together and things fell apart between us. After we separated was when many things changed in my life, when I lost my path and turned into the "fortune teller" and a shut-in. It was then that I met women, that I flaunted my powers, that I perfected my studies, and that eventually I fell into a sort of sulking depression and found myself on the island and finally found myself again in the stars and my studies. I lost all of the things that I could have been, the great, powerful, and renown wizard that I could have been… I attempted to put that behind me as I made another cup of coffee and climbed onto the roof of my house to sullenly watch the moon rise and the stars come out.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, there should be updates at least every two weeks until the fall semester starts assuming that I don't get taken away by some other activity. Thank you for reading.


	6. Light

When I woke up on my roof my coffee cup had rolled off and broken on the street, an unfortunate happening but something that couldn't really be avoided when one was that exhausted. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and cracked my back as I looked to the lightening sky. I had no vivid memory of the last time I'd watch the sunrise but I recalled that in my youth it had been something I had quite enjoyed. The sky started its fade from purple to light blue and the sun burst up against the silhouette of the opposite end of the island, lighting up the summery green fields as it rose higher and higher into the sky, waking up the world with its burning presence.

This morning reminded me of the many years in which I had woken before the rest of the world so that I could watch nature lazily open its eyes to a new day. I had taken a secret pleasure in viewing the world rise with the sun. As I sat there listening to the sounds of a morning that had only just begun I realized that I couldn't remember what had taken that joy away from me, what had turned me away from the light in favor of the haze of the moon and stars… I was filled with a strange mixture of emotions as I descended from my roof to clean up the shards of porcelain and return to my chambers. Perhaps one could call it sadness, but it was really something more like melancholy loneliness or regret…

* * *

I returned to my studies uninterrupted until later that day when Maya came to visit me. The bouncy girl opened my door carefully and peeked in with a restrained smile before coming inside. "Wizard?" She said a little too loudly for my taste. I nodded. "Will you look into Chase's heart for me?" I smiled at her slightly and rose from my desk. Maya was a bit of an annoyance, there was no doubt about that, but the way she constantly pined for Chase had somewhat endeared her to me. She seemed to be nearly jumping with anticipation as I moved over to my crystal ball, but perhaps that was just me over analyzing everything again.

As my hands came to hover over the crystal ball the insides fogged but quickly cleared to a bluish haze as I searched for Chase's desires. Since summer had started Chase's favorite fruit of all was finally in season, which was good news for Maya. "Oranges." I said firmly and then took my hands away from the ball, allowing it to return to its clear state.

"Thankyouthankyouthankyou!" Maya said in her typical rushed state and grinned as she dug around in the pocket of her poufy dress for my payment. "I knew that was probably what he wanted but you can never be too careful about being sure you're doing everything right, you know?" She finished and handed me something along the lines of $20. Maya couldn't always pay me well, but $20 was more than what most people paid me and some chose to pay me in meals or coffee – or laundry in Colleen's case. Simple things like telling a fortune weren't difficult for me and took almost no time but it was a reliable source of income, I charged more for more involved tasks like making remedies but those requests didn't come along often.

I inclined my head to Maya and smiled slightly as she turned to dash out the door and get some oranges for Chase. I enjoyed watching Maya slowly break through to Chase. He had always been standoffish and condescending to her but she persisted and improved and he was starting to open up to her. They were a good match. Other than Maya and the married couples of the island the only others who came to me were a very small number of other young bachelors and bachelorettes. The young doctor, Jin, came in occasionally for magical remedies or advice on wooing the farmer's daughter and the ranch girl Rene came every so often to find out what sort of fish would be best to bring to Toby. The way the young people sought love from their counterparts was intriguing to me, I had no empathy for their situation. Something about helping them find love was just a little bit fulfilling to me though; perhaps they had become the new source of light in my life…

* * *

I grew frustrated with my work on the casting circle over the next week or so, so I turned decided to brush up on my physics for a while and that's what I was doing when Angela finally came through my door again. I shifted in my chair to watch her come through the door and walk towards me with a vaguely happy expression. She smiled largely and reached into her rucksack. "Thank you." She said and extended her hand out to me, opening it to reveal a large purple mushroom that shimmered and glowed in the dim lighting of my home, a fugue mushroom. I looked up at her from my seat with slightly widened eyes, fugue mushrooms were hard to find and precious ingredient for potions and the like. "It's for you, to say thank you for your help in getting the green bell, it seemed like something you would like."

I gently took the mushroom from her hand and stood from my desk with a soft smile. "Thank you very much, I love these." Angela smiled back at me as I moved over to place the fungus in a jar with the few others that I had yet to use in potions. When I turned around to look at Angela again she had a strange expression on her face, as though she was trying to figure something out or gather her thoughts. "Yes? ... Do you need something?"

Angela shook herself slightly and looked at me where I stood a few feet away then glanced at my crystal ball and back to me. "Um… Yes... If you're still willing to read my fortune?..." She said, blushing ever so slightly.

I could swear that the moment those words left her lips my blood went cold and I couldn't hope to explain why. Her visits had broken my routine because of their odd nature but the fact that she was requesting her fortune tossed her back into the group that was everyone else on the island, individuals who used me as a tool to get closer to the ones that they desired. The thought that Angela had just made herself no different than the rest was chilling, and deeply wounding to the misconception that she may have actually been interested in my company at any point. I nodded and moved stiffly over to stand beside my crystal ball, carefully hiding away my emotions as I had practiced for so very many years.

"Luke…" She said tentatively, glancing at my blank face only to turn back to the floor with a slight blush. My emotions at the time could be compared to a violently boiling liquid trapped under the lid of its pot, had Angela been watching me instead of investigating her fingernails she would have seen me lift about an inch off of the ground with my magical overflow when that name hit me like one of the Witch's fire balls. My hands trembled ever so slightly as they hovered over the crystal ball and it lit up as I delved into the heart of the apparent object of Angela's desire. Luke was, for lack of a better word, a complete idiot. He was the son of the carpenter, an insufferable practical jokester with a general lack of common sense, and had next to no value aside from being a wood chopping machine. Frustration lit through me as I peered into his mind, _this was what Angela was interested in! _I took a deep breath and looked back to Angela, speaking in a flat tone. "Mayonnaise. Of the highest quality you can get. That's what he wants."_ What an idiot._

"Thank you Wizard." Angela said with a somewhat relieved smile. I choked back my emotion and mustered a slight smile to return her. "What do I owe you?"

"… Nothing…" I muttered and turned away from the crystal ball and Angela. "Don't worry about it…" I finished and walked up the stairs to the upper level of my home, waiting for Angela to leave. She lingered for a moment but didn't take too long to ever so quietly walk out the door and back to her life without another word.

It struck me as I looked out the windows of the upper level of my house, observing the goings on of the town in the late afternoon and watching Angela as she made her way back towards the fields, that I had taken an interest in this girl who I had somehow perceived to be different from the others. I couldn't find any reason to this judgment; Angela had been somewhat rude and had, like the others, primarily come to me seeking assistance. The redeeming factor must have then been that she had wanted to visit more than the minimum and that she brought gifts beyond what was culturally required.

I tried in vain to erase Angela from my mind as I extended my hand and called a coffee cup from my cabinet. When the mug reached my hand it lit in a red glow and burst in a minor explosion before I could restrain the magical flow I had neglected to yet handle. A stream of curses, not all of them in modern English, flooded from my mouth as I used my emotional magic to disintegrate the chunks of stoneware and heal the long gashes that had been sliced into my hand. I cursed myself further when I realized I was still levitating slightly above the ground, it was bad practice to do that in front of the village people and Angela had no doubt seen me carelessly float up the stairs before she left. I returned myself forcefully to the ground and punched the wall nearest me. _Of course_ I had alienated myself again, I was always such an idiot when it came to people these days. The epiphany hit me harder than lightning conjured by the Witch ever could have: I had lost every touch of the debonair womanizer I had briefly been over 200 years ago and now that I finally met a woman that intrigued me just for being the person that she was I was going to lose her to a spazztic idiot, feel obligated to actually help her woo him, and then have to watch them be happy together.

The light that I had previously felt when helping these silly people obtain their counterparts went out. The world was a dark place again.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, there should be updates at least every two weeks until the fall semester starts assuming that I don't get taken away by some other activity. Thank you for reading.

Sorry that this update did take slightly longer than the other ones. I have a lot of homework to finish before school starts back up again so I haven't had a lot of time to work on this. These chapters take me a few hours to write and I prefer to do them in one sitting. Additionally, my baby chinchilla broke his leg very badly this past weekend and it had to be amputated. He's doing okay but that was a huge source of stress to me over the past few days.


	7. Desires

A few hours later the moon had risen and I crept from my house wearing my purple cloak and drifted silently out of the town. The pastel homes of the villagers were dark and quiet as I moved past them and not a soul other than myself seemed to be awake. My boots made hardly a sound as I entered the more agriculturally focused side of the island, Angela's sleeping ranch earned a sideways glance from me as I passed because of the dim lights that were still on in her house but I didn't give it anymore thought as I continued onward to my destination. When I met the gates to the Fugue Forest that night I met them as a different man than I had before, a man that was simultaneously both older and younger in different ways.

I had told myself when I left my home that I was going to the Fugue Forest to look for magical ingredients, but as my hand reached out tiredly to the gates and I passed into the labyrinth of trees all of my internal false pretenses faded away. I was here for one thing and one thing only: to speak with the Witch Princess. The forest was eerie but I found it to be somewhat nostalgic in the way that the trees formed a dense canopy that shaded the maze of fauna in filtered green moonlight – it was somehow reminiscent of my Master – though I almost felt as though I had passed into some magical cathedral when the moon and stars vanished from overhead. The aura of another being that had draped their person in various incantations, the Witch, unknowingly called me through the dense and winding foliage of the forest with sure footing.

I strode up through her little swamp and to front her cottage calmly, with an air of confidence that I hadn't had about me at quite that magnitude for at least 50 years, and knocked on her door. Mere moments passed before Witch wrenched her pink door open a cocked an eyebrow at me with one hand on her hip, just as haughty as ever. I gave her a sly smirk, slid my hands into the pockets of my pants, and slunk past her like a cat that had snuck out of the house triumphantly returning to warmth of its domain. I glanced about the candlelit room, the front room was the bulk of her living quarters, decorated primarily in tones of pink with girlish furniture, and to the far side of her home she had sectioned off an alcove of sorts for what could only be magic casting. I turned to Witch just in time to see her kick the door shut and run her hand through her long silvered hair. As I looked her up and down I remembered how she always had a way of making the most of what she had, her clothes accentuated and exaggerated everything about her from her tiny waist in her corset, feigned large hips in the poufy bloomer-like shorts, and shapely long legs in tight thigh stockings. Witch walked right up to me, close enough that either of us leaning forward would have had us touching, and whispered in her purring voice right into my ear. "Did you forget that _I hate you_?"

When those words left her soft lips, lips that I remembered that I knew just a bit too well, whatever illusions I had been harboring that I was back to my previous self cracked and fell away and I found myself struggling to think why it was I had come to the Witch that solemn night. "How could I forget such an intense loathing, Princess?" I asked with a poorly feigned jovial voice, my eyes crinkling with the false smile I flashed at the Witch. It had been too long since I'd dealt dominantly and confidently with the Witch, I was out of my element and she had already taken the lead. I turned my face to the side but there was no escaping a girl as cunning and forward as the Witch.

She leaned forward and up onto the toes of her heeled shoes, still with no hope of reaching my lofty height, and her dainty little hand forcefully took hold of my jaw, pulling my face back around and down to look directly into her commanding yellow eyes. "And you call yourself Wizard." She scoffed after a few moments of making me endure her burning gaze; she released me but in doing so somewhat forcefully pushed my head back to the side. I raised my hand to rub the irritation from my chin but the expression on the Witch's face stopped me. Her features, normally highlighted by broad smiles or great bouts of fury, were dampened and exaggerated by the opposite curves that what seemed to be disappointment had created.

"I am a Wizard. _The_ Wizard." I said in an incredulous voice, but the Witch no doubt caught the subtle lacing of fear that I thought she did not agree with me anymore. She shook her head in an almost irate way and her eyes flashed back to me, her eyebrows jumping back to their standard aggravated position.

"No." She said firmly and took a step back towards me, her chest nearly bumping into mine she was so close as she stared back up into my downcast eyes. "You are not but a _man_. _**Gale**_." Her voice dripped from her plush lips like honeyed poison. My body was frozen with the use of my true name and my mouth opened slightly, as though to protest, but she interrupted quickly enough upon seeing that. "When we were apprenticed together, you were a Wizard. When we split and you ravaged the world with your talents, you were a Wizard. When you come through my door with nothing but the fake face of the brilliant Wizard I knew, you are nothing but _pathetic_." the Witch spat at me. She turned away from where I stood, trapped by her words, and sashayed over to a pink loveseat where she sat and slowly crossed her feminine legs, staring at me with a passion that was hers and hers alone.

It took a moment to compose myself, another magically endowed individual saying one's true name with less than good intentions was a powerful thing, but I then looked to the Witch with an understanding of what she was trying to get through to me. "It's the girl…" I said in a soft, dark voice. "The one that is ringing the bells for the Harvest Goddess… Something about her just woke me up from this monotone of study I've been living for the past hundred years or so…"

The Witch interrupted me with a loud giggle, typical of her. "Of course it's the girl. Of course it's a girl that reduces a great man that was already in repose to a complete _shell_ of his former glory."

"But there's the thing!" I interjected suddenly. "She was, at first at least, bringing me out of my as of late hermit-esque ways. It's not until earlier today that everything turned south… Angela, the girl, came to me and she ended with asking me to read the heart of a boy for her…" My momentary return to the explosive talkativeness that I sometimes slipped into with the Witch was then over and I faded back to the composed and solemn speaking mannerisms that I had adopted over more recent years. The Witch looked pensive as I moved to take a seat beside her. "Am I not good enough anymore to win the heart of even a single mortal girl? ..." I whispered solemnly.

Witch leaned into me, her head dropping gently onto my shoulder, and she took one of my slender hands in both of her small ones. Her white skin stood against my contrastingly toffee colored complexion like a question, but it was one I ignored in favor of the thought of how similar to this Angela's hands around mine would look. There was a time when the Witch and I were the most unstoppable team, but those times were long past and now we only experienced fleeting moments of kinship. My instinct at the time was to tilt my head down to rest it atop hers, just like old times, but her hat was in the way. "Wizard…" She said softly, in a tone that hadn't graced my ears in so long I forgot what it sounded like. "Being you… If it's meant to happen… I'm sure it will."

I sighed and my head dropped back onto the couch. "I'm too old for this…" The Witch giggled then and suddenly she was in my lap, straddling me and with her hands on my shoulders. I was frozen there with conflicted emotions. This was exactly like the Witch and I, this spontaneity, but now there was another factor, my legitimate interest in Angela.

"Well, it's a good thing girls like older men then, _right?_" Witch Princess purred, one eyebrow arching up ever so seductively. A little smirk found its way to my lips and I took the Witch's wrists in my hands, too quickly for her to escape me, then used one hand to grasp both of her wrists, trapping her where she was. I raised my eyebrows at her frustrated expression.

"_**Vivi.**_" I said with a smirk. "Whatever happened to hating me?..." The Witch was frozen by her name, with just a little bit of fear mixed into her indignation. I stood from the loveseat assuredly, one hand holding the Witch's wrists and the other scandalously beneath her rump to support her weight as she was raised several inches off of the ground by my superior height. All of my years of experience effortlessly commanding the attention of women were on the tip of my tongue just then as I gazed deep into Witch's bright amber eyes, she had never been an exception capabilities of charming the opposite sex. However, as I looked down at her, it was mutually under stood that I no longer desired her. Our flame, as bright as it had been, had blown out perhaps entire centuries ago and now that I had found another person to truly desire there was honestly no chance of rekindling it, even this once. Gently, I lowered the Witch to her feet and released her hands from my grip, though I kept one of my hands firmly at the small of her back until she regained her balance. "My apologies, Princess." I whispered to her in a tone that was intimate, and yet distanced.

Witch frowned at me and turned her head to the side as she placed one hand on her hip. "Sometimes I miss us." She said in a cool tone. "But I understand that we stopped working a long time ago, neither of us wanted to be the less powerful one in the relationship. I'll miss the spontaneous stuff too, but good luck with your girl, Wizard." I bowed deeply to Witch then, I appreciated that she had essentially just admitted her defeat to me, which was an almost unimaginable thing for her to do. When I raised myself again to bid her farewell she was levitating just in front of me – her favorite trick to get up to my height –and I was trapped beneath her lips. I kissed her back out of habit for an instant and when she quickly pulled away I found myself wondering if I would regret that final kiss. "You'll get her, there's no doubt about it. But she's mortal and one day she'll die, Wizard… I'll be waiting for you." The Witch said devilishly, and my stomach sunk at the thought. She winked, the little imp that she was, and swung her hips just a little more than usual as she made her way over to her cauldron.

"Farewell…" I said in an aged tone, and then turned to leave that accursed cottage and the inescapable enchantress that lived within. I mused as I walked home that I might remove my spells of immortality just to evade the Witch's promise but perhaps the truth to the matter was the thought that I would outlive the first mortal I had truly taken an interest in was painful to me. For the past century or more I had left behind my social obligations in favor of a safe and lonely lifestyle as a man people took as no more than a fortune teller. My time with the Witch had long been over, my time as a Wizard who flamboyantly paraded his power had passed, the vigor of a period in which I sought validation in a thousand different forms had faded, years contended with study and solitude and stars were drifting on, and I was entering a new phase in my life as the concept that I was no longer content to be without the company of another tickled my conscious.

But still, I knew not how to catch the attention of Angela as the man I was now. The charms of a womanizer did not breed the affections of a wife and I doubted the abilities of my current solemn demeanor to draw her away from the excitement of that insufferable idiot, Luke. I hoped desperately as I reentered my home that I, as merely the man I was, would be enough to make this enthralling new woman want me as I wanted her.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, there should be updates at least every two weeks until the fall semester starts assuming that I don't get taken away by some other activity. Thank you for reading.

This one was quick but I don't know when the next one will be up. Hopefully sometime next week?


	8. Tremors

Angela's next visit found me passed out, fully clothed and face down on my bed with books about plants spread not only around me but strewn across nearly the entire floor of my home. The jingle of the bell failed to rouse me and Angela quietly eased her way into the room, her boots barely creaking against my floor as I continued to sleep. After I returned from the Witch's home I had taken to my studies again, trying to find any notes I'd ever made about the various spells that were constantly wrapped around my person so I could study how one could reverse them and the effects of doing so. One goose chase had led to another and I was researching plants to find any instance of a particularly rare variety I couldn't seem to remember the name of. At nearly midday I had fallen onto my bed and Angela had come in to find me and my messy home unchanged at almost 5 o'clock. I groaned somewhat noisily as I unconsciously sensed her aura as she came further in to the room and I began to awaken. She gasped and hopped back a little as I rather quickly rolled off of my bed and onto my feet, nearly falling back onto my bed when my left foot slid the book it had fallen on across the floor. I looked around with wild eyes and a spell on the tip of my tongue, then took in Angela's slightly fearful appearance before easing myself from the slight crouch I was standing in and trying to clear the fog of fatigue from my mind.

I dragged my hands through my hair, coaxing the knots out of it, and glanced to the window, seeing that a substantial amount of time had passed. When I looked back to Angela she had a very tentative smile on her face. "You've been busy it seems… Maybe I should come back later?..." She asked guardedly. I couldn't help but wonder why she was here, what favor she had to ask of me now. I stopped those poisonous thoughts in their tracks as quickly as I could though; this was the girl I was hoping to catch the fancy of so I couldn't let myself get bitter so quickly, I couldn't let myself become such a jealous fool.

"No… No, that's fine… What do you need?" I said somewhat roughly, managing to offer her a smile before I turned away from her to gingerly pick up the book I had stepped on. I turned it in my hands and squinted past the slight boot-print I had left across the illustration and suddenly it hit me, this was exactly what I had been searching for. It was a sketch of a particularly rare strain of poppy which Master had grown in our greenhouse with a few stray notes beside it and one very important, though unrelated note, scrawled across the bottom of the page in my own hand. "Master's immortality dissertation, Bessnesmirit, page 60." I placed the herbology book onto my bed and scanned the room for the leather-bound Bessnesmirit, a tome I had hardly laid eyes upon since Master passed it on to me.

"Well…" Angela said quietly, following behind me as I strode towards the bookshelf I had practically upturned earlier looking for any trace of what I now knew hid inside a book I never would have thought to open for this purpose. "I… I was hoping you…" She was stumbling over her words now as I feverishly flipped through the pristine pages of the book. I wondered how it must look to her, it was written in a language that was now used sparingly even in magical society and was draped in several enchantments to preserve it, I had no idea what such an artifact would look like to the untrained eye. Finally I found what I was looking for and skimmed the next few pages with the desperate eyes of an addict only seconds from the release of his chosen poison, Angela had fallen silent behind me as I read.

"Wizard?..." Angela whispered behind me in a tremulous voice and carefully lifted a hand to my shoulder. "Wizard … What is it? You're shaking…" Ever so slowly I placed Bessnesmirit back into the book shelf and turned to Angela with new eyes. My entire body was in fact shaken by what I had read just then. "_It can therefore be seen that past a certain age removing spells of immortality will cause immediate death as the body will revert to its true age. For example, entities that are several centuries old through having been preserved by these incantations would revert to naught but dust._"

"It's nothing…" I said in a low voice, trying desperately to keep the pain out of my face and voice as she withdrew her hand. "What is that you'd hoped of me?" I finished smoothly, trying to gloss over the catastrophe that I had just experienced, she need not be worried over something so far beyond her comprehension as a mortal.

Angela looked at me with a solemn sort of confusion before she asked of me what she had come here for. "I came to ask you to read Luke's heart for me again." She blushed and looked away. "But if you don't want to right now then I understand!"

A sigh escaped my lips and I choked back every single protest that flooded into my mind. I was near breaking as I moved over to my crystal ball, shuffling to move the books that were still strewn across the floor out of the way. Angela bit her lip – _why was that so damn adorable?_ – and stared at her boots as the orb lit up under my hands. My fingers trembled a little as I delved into Luke's mind to find out what he wanted. In my hundreds of years of existence I had not been able to escape pain any better than anyone else on the planet but this was no doubt one of my most painful experiences to date, it was as though I was willingly giving her away to that idiot.

"Spinach." I said in a flat voice, dropping my arms back to my sides and staring at Angela as she brought her eyes back to mine. She was happy, I saw as I looked into her face, and that was a bittersweet thing. Her joy was among the best gifts she could give me, but because it was over her prospects with Luke I couldn't help but be hurt by it. What hope had I of showing her that, though? Certainly she thought of me as nothing but an eccentric man who had helped her once…

"Thank you, Wizard." She said brightly, her radiant smile only serving to drive me further into as state of self-loathing. I felt like an angst-y teenager as I nodded back at her and silently watched her leave my house, no doubt to find spinach to bring to Luke.

I turned away from my crystal ball and raised my hands to send all of the books and scrolls back into their shelves and stacks before taking a deep breath and attempting to compose myself. I failed. Those accursed tears were burning their way into my eyes and across my cheeks again as I furiously tried to rationalize my anguish.

It was too much to handle knowing now that I would, without any doubt, either outlive Angela or kill myself. I had, with all the youthful hope I had forgotten I could harness, thought that I might be able to find some great secret that would allow me to remove my spells and resume a mortal life at an age so close to hers. It was too good to be true of course, the idea that I could return to a normal timeline in order to pursue and hopefully live a life with Angela. Even if I managed to earn her heart now I would be haunted with the knowledge that I would one day have to watch her die…

* * *

The moon sailed high above me as I made my way to Angela's house that night. After I had finally composed myself I had resolved to make one single attempt for her heart and if she had no response to it then I would stand back and allow her to find her happiness with someone else. Hours spent at my desk had finally resulted in a gift which could certainly not be mistaken for anything but my own labors.

Her little farm house was strikingly dull and in rather poor shape but it looked as though she took fairly good care of it. Unlike the other night all of the lights were off now and she was no doubt sleeping. As silently as I could I approached the barren flower bed that started on the front of her house and wrapped around the side. My evening had been spent formulating something of a miracle as far as magical seeds went and I went to work spreading them around Angela's house and murmuring incantations over them.

When I finally turned to leave about an hour later rose bushes had grown hip high through the entire flower bed. Though they still sported the rather nasty thorns characteristic of the species there was something about them even more special than that they had grown overnight and would live and bloom indefinitely. The bushes were heavily laden with huge velvety roses in various states of bloom in the most striking shade of violet I could manage; it was truly a sight to see. As I made my way home it was all I could do to hope that this made some sort of impression on Angela.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, since school has started again I will still be trying to update as often as possible but it wouldn't be odd for it to be up to a month between updates, sorry. Thank you for reading.

My apologies for how incredibly long it took me to get this chapter up. Between getting sick, school starting, moving my brother back into his apartment at college, and a bit of writers block it wasn't until today that I even managed to write it. Have you ever experienced the feeling of knowing exactly how you want a story to go but having no luck with getting it there? That's basically how this went so it really isn't up to par. If you see any way that I could improve it then please let me know.

To everyone who has read, favorited, watched, or followed this story: Thank you so much! Normally I write everyone an individual response and thank you but since some of your lovely comments have been anonymous and I've been so busy as to fall behind it really isn't possible this time. I promise I'll get back to doing that though!


	9. Beginnings

By the next day I had resigned myself to my almost certain failure. Luke was probably warming up to Angela, such a charismatic and devoted girl couldn't possibly be refused when she put her mind to earning someone's heart, and my small gift would merely serve to brighten her day. I had accepted that. Angela was a silly girl, she seemed to be intellectual when she tried but the nuances of a creature so out of practice as myself would probably be mistaken for a simple kindness. So I sat at my desk, glad that my gift would make her smile, but weary with the thought that I would not succeed in winning her heart and that I would watch her live a long and full life with someone else.

One can imagine my surprise, then, when Angela came into my home bright and early with dark circles so pronounced that it looked as though she hardly could have slept at all. She had one of the purple roses clutched to her chest with a white knuckled hand and appeared to have tears in her eyes. Her lips quivered ever so slightly and she sniffled a bit. I was completely dumbstruck, this behavior was baffling. _Why in the world did she look so hopeless?_ I had sprung from my chair when she entered and I hovered with one hand resting on the back of it while she stood motionless in the doorway. Cautiously, I took in her aura. It was so full of confusion, so very knotted with sadness. My chest ached and I could hardly figure why before my body was moving of its own volition towards her.

Analysis of the situation had escaped me entirely as I reached her and I only managed to hesitate for the most miniscule space of time before my arms raised, wavering only slightly, and closed around Angela. Holding her in my arms was unsettlingly reminiscent of a time when I had cradled a broken-winged bird. I hoped hysterically that this time the fragile creature wouldn't die in my arms. Angela pressed her face into my chest and her fingers knotted into the front of my robe as she abandoned herself to sobs that shook her entire body. Unconsciously, I tightened my arms a bit, and then raised one hand to sort of pet the back of her head. I was entirely out of my element in this situation; I could handle fighting or betrayal or any sort of thing but I was unprepared for the emotional wreckage that was pressed up against my body at that moment.

The two of us stood like that until Angela's crying began to subside, then her legs began to give out beneath her. I nearly had a heart attack as she started to slide down in my arms but I caught hold of my sanity enough to remember that I certainly had the strength to carry her. I tried to be gentle when I hoisted her up into my arms but I had always been a somewhat clumsy sort of rough in handling others. Her head fell into the space between my neck and shoulder and her hands stayed balled up in my robes as I adjusted my hold around her legs and shoulders and moved towards my bed. Whatever emotional upheaval that she was victim to had no doubt left her in some sort of shock, as was exemplified by her sudden fainting, but nevertheless her little hands still kept a death grip to my cloak when I tried to lay her down on the bed. I frowned slightly and shifted her until I found a position that looked comfortable. When I had settled I sat across my bed with my back against the wall and she laid on the bed but draped across me with her hands still clutching me and her head on my shoulder. I stared down at her as she fell into a deep sleep and I wondered, my mind ran wild with thoughts as all of the different possibilities laid themselves out before me. How would this all turn out? I reached out my hand slowly and ran my thumb gently beneath her eyes, wiping away her tears. My brows furrowed as I considered what possibly could have affected her so much but I could make no feasible conjecture so I just titled my head back against the wall and contemplated the shaft of light filtering through the light curtains over my window while I waited for her to come round.

* * *

Sleeping in the presence of Angela was becoming far too common a happening. After merely five minutes of her nestled calmly in my arms I had drifted into to slumber as well and it wasn't until she began to stir that I was roused again. I blinked the sleep from my mind and gazed down at her as she arched her back slightly, her brow furrowed. Angela's arms had at some point come up to wrap around my neck and my own hands were casually linked by the fingers around her slim waist; I drew my hands back rather quickly, hoping that she wouldn't notice my breach of her personal space. Her eyes ever so slowly began to open and blinked profusely, she yawned and looked at me with a rather befuddled expression before unhooking her arms from around my neck. She sat up and slid away from me.

"You, um… You fainted…" I said in a tired tone, averting my eyes from hers and raising my hand to scratch the side of my face. "You wouldn't let go of my robes… so I tried to make you comfortable…" I heard a strange sort of sigh from Angela beside me but didn't look at her. "Are you… Are you alright?"

"I suppose I'm alright." She said in a voice even more exhausted then my own, I nodded. A few moments passed and she reached her hand out to draw mine from my lap and take it in both of hers. My lips tightened into a doubtful line and I finally turned to meet her eyes once again. She was smiling at me. I tightened my hands around hers and organized my thoughts well enough to answer the question that wouldn't seem to leave me alone.

"What happened?..."

"Oh…" she whispered in a tiny voice. Angela bit her lip and glanced over to the rose where it had been forgotten on the floor. "Luke… Um… Well he and Selena…" She choked up then but I understood what she was getting at. It was just like Luke to end up chasing after the more voluptuous Selena, and she would certainly have come round to his confidence and compliments. I exhaled slowly and then reached out the hand that wasn't held captive by hers to sort of cup her cheek and pull her around to look at me so I could give her a sad smile. She gave me a faltering one in return and clutched my hand a little tighter. "Wizard…"

"Hm..?" I ran my thumb softly across her cheek before taking my hand away from her and returning it to my lap. Even if it didn't work out I realized I was happy to have had this small time with Angela, and to have made her feel a little better.

"I'm sorry… I asked you to help me win someone else's heart and when it didn't work… Well I saw all of those roses the next morning and I knew they had to be from you… I just couldn't handle it… I rushed through the farm work and ended up here as some sort of sniveling mess… I never really considered your feelings at all… And I should have…" She sort of rushed through her words, and then paused and then rushed again. I smiled faintly as she spoke, doing my best to synthesize her story and feeling slightly warmed by her apology.

"Angela." I said firmly, stopping her from continuing what was starting to become nonsense. She bit her lip. "It's fine. I will always be here… for you…" I smiled melancholically at her. Suddenly she was all around me, her arms around my neck and her body pressed up against me. In my surprise I let her aura flood into my mind at full intensity and I was nearly blinded by the affectionate joy that was radiating from her. After I composed myself I wrapped my arms around her in return. We remained like that for a few moments before she began laughing in a contagious manner, I couldn't help but smile. When she pulled away she gave me a stupidly big grin.

"How could I ever possibly thank you enough?"

I nearly froze when those words came from her mouth. How could I possibly tell her any of the answers that came flooding into my mind? They were far too extreme to offer as solutions at such an early point so it took me a few moments to come to a reasonable answer. "Just… Keep visiting." I said with a careful smile.

"Of course! Deal!" She said with a big laugh. She swiftly leaned forward to kiss me on the cheek and then just as quickly she had slid her way off of the bed and dashed out the door with a wave over her shoulder as she went. I listened to the patter of her boots against the cobble as she ran out of town and then slowly stood from the bed, my hand pressed against my cheek. She had _kissed _me. My mind was fuzzy and my heart beat erratically as I used magic to conjure a vase and water for the purple rose that still sat forgotten on the ground. _This just might work._

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, since school has started again I will still be trying to update as often as possible but it wouldn't be odd for it to be up to a month between updates, sorry. Thank you for reading.

Sorry about this taking so long! This chapter took a lot of thinking to get it to where I wanted it and I've been incredibly busy with school. I realized as I wrote this chapter that this particular story, and especially this chapter, has been inspired largely by the novel Rose Daughter by Robin McKinley. Robin McKinley is one of my favorite authors and if she weren't on the list of authors who desires that their work not have fanfic published then I would certainly write for her stories as well. I definitely recommend anything that's written by her.

Thank you so much to anyone who has read, watched, reviewed, or favorited this story! I hope you enjoy it and will continue to read.


	10. Cosmic

The remainder of the day passed uneventfully. For the most part I merely sat at my desk and allowed my feelings to ruminate. My chest felt full, as though I had a pressure on my heart. It was almost a painful feeling, but I found it to be pleasant because of its source.

When the night had fallen and a crescent moon had risen into the sky I stepped outside to consider the heavens for a bit. I doubted that it would present any useful information to me. Horoscopes and other zodiac methods would be useless because though I knew she was a Taurus I knew not what my own sign was, having long ago deemed my birthday was useless information. Probably a Capricorn, but maybe an Aries or a Scorpio? My personality had been fairly various over the years. I wondered vaguely if any of the Zodiacs actually applied to magical beings.

I walked slowly down to the lighthouse, enjoying the slight breeze blowing through the warm summer air. I preferred viewing the stars in the winter but the sky looking nice tonight as well. Just then I remembered that a comet was going to pass overhead tonight, and a fairly big one too. I had an idea, a big important one. One that just might make an impression on Angela. I spun around and took off back across the bridge and around the harbor, my boots snapping loudly against the stone. I kicked up dust as I ran down the path to Angela's farmhouse, running alongside her field in full bloom, and stopped to catch my breath on her porch. It was only a few moments before I lifted my hand and rapped loudly on her door, hoping that I wasn't interrupting anything and taking the bright lights shining from curtained windows as a sign that she was still awake.

Practically holding my breath, I waited. Despite my long life my patience wasn't doing me much good in this situation, a few seconds was far too long for me to wait when I was so anxious. Finally she opened the door. She looked tired, but she gave me a wide smile and stepped aside to allow me into her home. I shook my head and smiled back, extending a hand behind me as a gesture for her to come out. "I've got something special to share with you. We don't have too much time."

"Oh, what's that?" She asked in a tentative voice, stepping onto the porch and shutting the door behind herself. I looked into her face and realized then that her hair was damp and she smelled slightly of something floral, probably her shampoo. It was nice, different from the earthy scents that followed her after her work, though those were also pleasant.

"It's still a little bit of a secret. You'll see in a moment." I smiled and held out my hand. Luckily, she took it. I led her slowly out into the empty field behind her house and beside the river pond and pointed at the dark horizon, knowing in mere moments the comet would come blazing into view. The stars did not let me down.

Just as Angela was about to open her mouth to ask what exactly to be looking for the comet became visible, a bright head and a bluish green tail streaking through the sky rather quickly, it would come nearly directly over us. She sighed in what I hoped was a contented way and I caught her quiet whisper of "It's beautiful". I squeezed her hand a little tighter and smiled into the sky, but I doubt that she noticed.

"Watch this!" I took my hand from hers then and raised my hands to the sky. I slowly murmured an incantation, focusing carefully, and watched as first my hands and then the sky lit up just a little bit. I felt what I could only think of as a tear in the cosmos and pulled just a little bit with spell, temporarily opening up the tiniest of holes just before the comet passed directly overhead.

Stardust from the tail of the comet came drifting down in a flurry not too much unlike snow, though a little lighter. Angela looked into the fine dust as it fell, I could tell she was holding her breath. I smiled at the vision she was as the dust touched down, landing all over her eyelashes and frosting her hair, it all lit up in the moonlight. She was an understated sort of beautiful, a type of average that would be stunning if she put in some effort. But I thought that perhaps I preferred her natural like this, as an earthy girl in touch with herself and the world.

The stardust continued to sift down for a little while, drifting and dancing in the moonlight as it coated us and our little field. I muttered the end of the spell to lace closed the tiny rip in the cosmos and smiled big at Angela. She giggled, nearly uncontrollably, and shook some of the glittering powder out of her spiky hair. I reached out a hand and caught her face in it, then used my thumb to rub a little bit of her cheek clean. The stardust was so smooth, almost like a coating of baby powder. She grinned at my and then nearly tackled me in a hug, throwing her arms around my waist. I smiled over her head and closed my arms around her shoulders.

I don't know that I've ever felt happier than I did in that moment. I was holding girl that I'd never thought I'd meet after I ran to her house in the middle of the night to open the cosmos and shower her in stardust. She was a bit like stardust herself, I thought. Just a little magical and beautiful despite the initially plain appearance, and she also wasn't the easiest thing to get without a bit of coincidence and effort.

I squeezed her a little tighter and then pulled back. She released her hold on me and I led her back to the porch and bid her farewell. "I've ruined the effects of your shower. I hope I haven't entirely ruined your evening though."

"Not at all." She replied in a sort of bubbly voice. "Far improved it I would say."

"Very good. Well, goodnight." I said, then bowed deeply to her. I raised my head at the sound of her slight giggle, and smirked at the sight of her blush. Perhaps bowing had gone out of style in courtship over the more recent years?

"Goodnight, Wizard." She said and before I had time to process it she had jumped in to give me a kiss on the cheek again. I nearly forgot myself but as I saw her turn back to her door an idea caught hold of me. I grabbed her hand and pulled her back around to give her a kiss on the cheek as well.

"Sweet dreams." I turned and walked away then, without looking back. Truthfully, I was a little afraid to see what her reaction was. The sound of her door shutting didn't come until I'd almost made it the edge of her property. I allowed myself to smile a little wider then. If everything went my way this spontaneous visit had a made a good impression on Angela. Hopefully it had shown her I meant to be a little more than an exciting and devoted friend. I walked home feeling a little lighter than I had originally left it, though the full feeling in my chest had never really left.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially constructive criticism or praise, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, since school has started again I will still be trying to update as often as possible but it wouldn't be odd for it to be a month or more between updates, sorry. Thank you for reading.

Oh good god. It would take a lot to truly explain how busy I've been recently. I had a massive design lab, multiple projects, holidays, family in town, etc etc. Between that and getting dumped on my ass in a long term relationship I hadn't been expecting to end I've really just had too much on my plate, not to mention my laptop being broken until I just got a new one yesterday. Thank you to everyone who has reviewed, favorited, or followed my story since the last update and I'm sorry I didn't respond to you individually as I normally do. The next update may be a little while in coming since winter break is now over and I'm returning to school.

Thank you so much to anyone who has read, watched, reviewed, or favorited this story! I hope you enjoy it and will continue to read.


	11. Changes

I watched the sun rise the next morning from the shore of the beach, my legs dangling off the edge of dock. Toby had come out and sat beside me, without a word. I wondered if perhaps he had dozed off, sitting there so quietly with me as the sunrise reflected onto the ocean and lit up the underside of the clouds. The colors were like the cotton candy they sell at the circus or similar carnivals sometimes, the ocean and the sky were such a light blue but the bottoms of the clouds were a fluffy pink. The sight was quite dazzling really, a more beautiful sunrise than I'd seen in quite a while. Once the horizon had stopped changing colors Toby got up silently and went back into the Fishery. He seemed like a nice enough guy, very relaxed and kind, but I doubted that I'd ever be outgoing enough to have any true interaction with him.

As I sat and listened to the waves washing in and out of the little bay I allowed my mind to empty out for a little while. The pure energy and the sounds of the nature around me filled the empty spaces. The sounds of water washing across sand and slapping against the concrete and of the wind whispering between the buildings and brushing the clouds through the sky were almost speaking to me. Everything would be silent aside from nature for just a little longer, the village behind me was still sleeping. Even though the faint melodies of the bells could be heard again, I missed hearing the sounds of the gods among them. My spirits dropped ever so slightly at the pauses where the goddess's harmonies should have been along with the powerful humming of the Harvest King. I wondered for a moment how much longer it would take for Angela to revive the Harvest Goddess. But I knew I shouldn't rush such a thing, since Angela was no doubt trying her hardest.

"How do you feel about Angela?" The wind whispered to me softly, prompting me to reflect on my emotions. I thought for a moment in an attempt to discern the mixture of emotions that related to her and came up with a rather convoluted answer to the question. I liked Angela, certainly, more than I'd liked nearly any person I'd ever met. Something about her was simply enchanting, perhaps how nice she was and how concerned she was about everyone around her. She was a person with a kind heart and good intentions, even though she messed up from time to time. But she was more than that too; she also had the courage to go against horrible odds in her attempt to save the island and the tenacity to start a farm on her own when she had limited experience and help. Angela was unlike most other girls I'd ever had experience with, and that was charming to me. I realized that I just wanted her to be happy, because there was so much good in her. I also realized that nothing would make me happier than to be a reason for her happiness.

I smiled and felt I had found an appropriate answer to the question, which lifted my spirits some. It had been a long time since I'd had any feelings to think about anyway. I returned to my house, in order to avoid the inhabitants of the village before they began to stir, and busied myself by returning to my work with the concentration crystals. Things were going alright for the time being and I hoped that they would stay that way for a little while longer.

* * *

Angela came to visit me every day for the next week. It was always in the late afternoon and she always brought a small gift for me, either a fugue mushroom she was lucky enough to find or an herb she thought I might like. I don't think I'd ever really been happier than I was then, with the thought that she enjoyed my presence.

But then, one day, she didn't show up.

I was worried, to say the least. Angela hadn't said anything about being busy. There were no events occurring that I could think of. It was an average day, nearing the end of the summer, so it wasn't as though she was spending time in her fields changing her crops over to those for the next season. I was fairly certain that it wasn't a harvesting day. Night fell and midnight approached, Angela still had not arrived. I went to my crystal ball and with the precise question "where is Angela?" and I called forth my magic in an attempt to find her. I could not.

How could this be happening? My thoughts were frantic as I struggled to reach out with my mind to find her aura. How could my magic be failing me? But most of all, where could she have gone to? Without another thought I went running out of my house, not even bothering to grab a cloak as I burst into the humid summer night. I waved a hand behind me to extinguish my candles and lock my doors and a small incantation muffled the loud snap of my boots against the cobblestone as I ran out of town towards Angela's home. The lights were off and I could not sense her aura within the home. I felt as though my heart were beating at twice the normal speed as I struggled to find an answer to my predicament. Certainly she hadn't left the island, she would have told me. I tried to find another solution but the only idea that came into my head was the horrible possibility that something might have happened to her, and I didn't want to think of that.

Without a second thought I extended my hand to the doorknob and before I could whisper an incantation to unlock it I found that it wasn't locked to begin with. I burst into her home, a large one-room space, and there was no hint that she was there. I surveyed the space quickly, finding it made up as she would have left it that morning, and turned to leave the house. I stood on her porch for a few spare seconds and closed my eyes, trying to sort out the world and the energies around me, hoping desperately for some sort of hint. The wind was blowing ever so softly. I could hear the sounds of the river and the ocean not far from where I stood. The earth below me had a deep thrumming of health to it. Everything seemed right in the world, the people were healthy and nature was strong. I strained a little harder, trying to grasp something just out of my reach.

There it was, the melody of the bells ringing just below the surface of the elements all around me. Then, of even greater importance than that, the sounds of the goddess singing were weaving their way through the land. I nearly cried when I caught that thread, that tiny string of hope that meant Angela had succeeded in reviving her. I took off running again, up the mountain path behind Angela's house, racing for the Goddess and a hint about Angela's whereabouts. But, as I ran, another sound graced my ears, the powerful humming of the Harvest King and the earthy beat of his presence atop the mountaintop. As I passed the entrance to the Goddess' Spring I didn't even glance toward it, I had a pretty good idea where I would find Angela: atop the mountain.

I entered the darkness of the mine without any hesitation. Mines were dangerous places, and I knew that, but at this point I was consumed with my worries about where Angela could possibly be. I had visited with the Harvest King before and I had never known his power to overshadow my magic or block my ability to see auras. My worst fears were coming true as I allowed the suffocating force of the Harvest King's presence to pull me forward through the mine on the path to the top of the mountain, something must have happened to Angela. My lungs were starting to burn as I ran and ran, using magic to destroy rocks and crystals that blocked my way and climbing the stairs as fast as I could. In retrospect I could have used magic to ease my body's burden, but it did not occur to me in my state of panic. Suddenly I saw her, and I breathed a sigh of relief just before I realized that it wasn't appropriate to relax just yet.

Angela was crumpled on the ground, her hammer off to the side and a layer of sweat shining on her forehead. Her breathing was heavy and her eyes were closed, she seemed to be passed out. Her aura was one of the weakest I had ever seen, as if she was about to die. I ran to her and dropped down onto my knees at her side, feeling her forehead only to find that she had a very heavy fever. I shook Angela's shoulders and her eyes fluttered opened, she made a dazed expression at me before saying something in such a quiet, raspy voice that I couldn't understand her. Her eyes slid slowly back closed and she let out a pathetic cough. I panicked for a moment or two and had immense trouble calming myself down enough to come up with a plan. I slid my arms underneath Angela and hoisted her up with me, a little rougher than I would have liked to, and took off in the direction of the Harvest King again.

As I felt Angela's limp body against me, her weight in my arms like a weight on my heart as I ran towards what I thought was my only chance for bringing her back to me. I was glad that I had worried. I was so very glad that I had wondered where she was so much that I went looking for her. I could not even imagine how broken I would have been to find out that she had been found, days later, in the mine by Owen when he was working or Phoebe while she explored. I was so incredibly glad that maybe, just maybe, things were going to work out alright.

Yet, at that very same moment, I was struck by a greater sadness than I had ever experienced before. It was greater than what I'd felt when I lost my family. It was greater than what I'd felt when Vivi and I ruined our relationship. It was even greater than the grief I'd felt when Master had passed away. This feeling, a mixture of fear and sadness and hope, was a feeling so great because I knew, as I held Angela in my arms, that I loved her. I loved her with everything I had because she was a compassionate girl with legitimate interest in helping the world and the people in. She was a kind and honest girl who had legitimate interest in _me_. I had never before felt so involved with the fate of another person, another person I so desperately wanted to live a happy life.

I burst onto the mountaintop, covered in a thin sheen of sweat from the exertion of carrying the feverish Angela, and the Harvest King looked to me with an expression of moderate surprise. I ran to him with my own face held into one of utter panic. "She could have died, you fool! After everything she's done for the island!" I called out in a frustrated and desperate tone as I ran up the stairs to the King's platform.

He quirked his thick red eyebrows at me and looked me up and down. "I, a fool? Oh Wizard, you are such a special little creature." The Harvest King said in a voice that was pure and harmonious despite the booming power it held, echoing off the surround rock formations.

I frowned heavily and couldn't help but begin to cry as I kneeled down and gently set Angela onto the ground. "Harvest King…" I whispered in a choked voice as I tried my hardest to accept that at this point I was at a loss about what to do to help her. "Please… I don't know what's wrong with her… Her aura is weak and I'm lucky I found her in the mine… She called you and she revived the island… Please help her…" I don't think I've ever begged for help like I begged right then. I was entirely at the mercy of the Harvest King as I knelt before him and asked him to sort out a problem I was far too panicked about to find a solution for myself, I was afraid Angela was too far gone. "Please…" I whispered even softer than before, my old accent coming into my voice even more clearly than before and then I reverted to the old language completely. "Asv darashi tagha…" _I love her…_

"Wizard…" The Harvest King said in his booming voice. "She has more than earned her revival." He smiled down at me with a sad undertone, but one that acknowledged my words and understood my desperation. He held out one hand nonchalantly and his warm magic, the magic of nature and energy itself, poured from him into the struggling body of Angela. She roused slightly then, color coming to her face and her eyes opening slowly to the image of me leaning over her. "Take better care of her next time" the Harvest King said in a joke, that was far less than funny, before he turned away from us and went back to looking over the edge of the cliff and down onto the sleeping island below us. I lifted Angela in my arms and walked back down into the mine with her still looking into my face with the most confused expression.

"I was worried about you." I said softly, as I maneuvered us back down through the winding pathways and roadblocks of the mine. Angela reached up silently to wipe away the tears I forgot I had shed. I exhaled slowly, my first breath of relief since I had begun my panicked attempt to help her. "You never came by and I couldn't find your aura… I couldn't see you in my crystal ball... You weren't home when I went looking for you…" I choked out.

"I'm sorry…" she interrupted me in a gentle whisper. "Things were going just fine until I tried to come back down from the mountaintop. I did a lot of things today and I was tired. I broke a lot of bad stones in a row, the kind with the poisonous gasses inside, and I'd already used all my medicine trying to come up here to call the Harvest King…" Angela seemed so genuinely sad at having caused me trouble that I nearly started to cry again. How dare her care so little about her own health and safety. The island could have waited another day. She could have died if I didn't come chasing after her.

"Angela… I just want you to be careful and safe… I'm glad I found you… And you're lucky the Harvest King healed your sickness…" I said, nearly choking up entirely as I admitted my feelings of great relief. At that moment in time I lacked to words to really express the knotted net of emotions that were tied up around my heart, but I think that she got the gist of things.

I carried her the rest of the way to her farmhouse and right up through the door, it was around 2 am when we finally arrived. Without a word I pulled her boots from her feet, set her into her bed, and pulled the covers up around her. I kissed her on the forehead as I went to leave her for the night, safe in her bed at last. But she held me there, putting her hands up around my neck to hold me with her. She kissed me on the cheek and then pulled me down further, moving her hands to more around my waist. I wasn't sure what she wanted so I stood there, trying to take in the nuances of her movements. Angela pulled me all the way down to on top of her bed, she inside the sheets and me outside of them, and put her arms around me, holding me tight to her. "Thank you" she whispered into my shirt. Then she began to cry and I slid my arms around her shoulders, pressing her tightly into my chest as she slowly fell asleep in my embrace. We spent the night that way, curled up together and crying like frightened children.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially praise or constructive criticism, is welcome. I plan to continue this story, there should be updates at least every two weeks until the fall semester starts assuming that I don't get taken away by some other activity. Thank you for reading.

Oh my god. You guys. I made it through junior year at IB without dying, I only have finals week left of school . I'm so ready to be finished. I am SO sorry that I didn't write a chapter sooner. Can you believe my idea for this chapter pretty much didn't exist until this afternoon when I wrote it?! Can you BELIEVE that!? Like I literally had no idea at all what to do with this chapter to get the story to go where I wanted it to go, I've had writers block for MONTHS. Anyway, I truly and sincerely hope that you enjoy this chapter. And I'd like to extend a big thank you to everyone who's read this story while I've been away struggling with schoolwork and studying trying to keep my grades at a decent level while I finished the school year. You're pretty much the best people ever.


	12. Hints

The sun came through Angela's windows at the normal hour, lighting up the dust motes that drifted lazily through the air. She didn't have any curtains so there was nothing to stop the ray of light that landed square in the middle of my face after the sun had peeked over the horizon. Angela was a bit luckier than me, having pulled her comforter up over her face and snuggled into my body. I squeezed her tight to me, savoring the feeling of her small frame, and exhaled deeply. I was still shaken from the previous night and was beyond grateful to know that she was safe there with me.

Ever so slowly I extracted myself from her, sliding arms this way and legs that way, until I was free and able to stand from the bed without disturbing the sleep I felt she desperately needed. Silently, as I had taken my boots off at some point the night before, I padded across the room to her kitchen. Coffee was on my mind as I looked around the slightly cluttered kitchen space. There were a variety of utensils and goods strewn about the counters, ranging from large pots to spoons to fresh fruits and vegetables, but I didn't see a bag of coffee beans or the conventional coffee makers most of the villagers used nowadays. I sighed and looked closer, lifting things here and there but keeping the noise down with the hope that I would certainly find one someplace. After all, Angela was probably about as reliant on coffee as I was with the amount of work she did in a day.

Finally I saw it and I was oh so glad that I did. It was a French press, which many people avoided because the name intimidated them or it seemed too fancy. On the contrary, it is a very easy way to produce a brew that has a stronger, richer flavor. Angela and I must have been two of one heart in regards to coffee, I thought with a quiet laugh as I pulled the French press off of the counter and looked around for the coffee beans. When I found the little burlap sack of tiny brown beans I considered to perhaps be more precious than gold, I was again pleasantly surprised. They were beans of shining quality, just like the ones that she had given me as her thanks months ago. As I started to go about my work I mulled over the idea that she might have sacrificed her own store of coffee with that gift. I carefully measured out the beans and ground them with magic to keep things quiet. I heated the water with a snap and a few murmured words before setting the brew and enjoying the aroma of the coffee while I allowed it to steep and watched it carefully. The secret to good coffee from a French press is a mixture of the grind and the timing. I didn't fancy myself any sort of coffee connoisseur but I appreciated the flavor of the beverage and had experimented with quite a few ways of making it over the centuries.

After I'd skimmed the sediment off the top I pushed down the plunger and smiled as the coffee filtered through. The bitter aroma filled the air as I poked around for a pair of mugs and I could hear as Angela slowly stirred on the other side of the room. I heard her comforter slide to the ground and her yawn loudly as I focused on pouring the coffee. With my own mugs I could pour without looking but I worried that since I'd never used these particular mugs or this French press I might overfill them or spill. The patter of Angela's feet as she came over made me smile again. By the inconsistent sound I guessed that she had lost one of her socks in her sleep. I turned, the coffee mugs in hand, to see her standing there with a wide grin and one hand on her hip. "And just what are you doing, Wizard?" She said.

She was absolutely stunning, I decided. Her bedhead stood out like a fuzzy halo, lit up from behind by the early morning sun spilling through her window. The backlighting highlighted the delicate but strong curves of her body. The swell of her hips, the good posture that created a graceful silhouette, the long expanse of her legs… it was all illuminated for me as she stood there in the sunlight. Her clothes from the night before were rumpled cutely, pinched up slightly at the waist so a sliver of her firm midriff showed. I smiled faintly at her and held one of the coffee mugs out to her. "Good morning… I took the liberty of making coffee…"

Her laugh burst through the air like the tinkling of bells. It was so good to hear that sound again after spending the night with her sobbing into my shirt. I joined in for a moment, chuckling softly before I took a sip of the coffee. She joined me, taking the mug from my outstretched hand and sipping from it. "Oh my…" she gasped out. She did it quietly though, perhaps not intending that I hear her. "This is excellent" she said louder. "Did you really make this with my stuff?"

"Mhm… There's always a better method… Just waiting around the corner…" I said slowly, my accent bleeding through ever so slightly in my tired state, and took another long sip of my coffee. "Maybe… I can teach you sometime… If you'd like…" I offered. Angela grinned again and told me that she'd like that.

* * *

I spent the rest of my morning with Angela. I trailed her like a confused duckling as she went about her farm chores. I was amazed by her versatility as she collected eggs, milked cows, fed all the animals, watered and weeded the field, and effortlessly coaxed all the animals outside. I refrained from asking her questions merely because I didn't know where to start. After she'd finished all the chores we went back inside and she made a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast. I didn't have a taste for eggs but Angela made them in an appetizing way, not runny at all and fairly well seasoned.

Around noon I went to leave her home and I was surprised Angela couldn't sense the happiness I felt I was practically radiating. I felt that she had somehow brought me back down to earth. I still guarded an unbreakable and carefully cultivated bond to the stars and my studies, of course, but Angela had reminded me that the daylight hours and the world we lived on had their own appeal as well. She gave me a hug as I went to part from her in the midday sun and walk home through the dust and humidity of summer. I felt so much happier than I did before I met Angela. Even though I hadn't recognized it within myself, it had been there. For the last century or more my aura had been becoming progressively more clouded as I avoided all other life on the planet. By boarding myself up with a fortune-teller's façade and spending my time tucked away with books and telescopes I had neglected to even remotely satisfy my social needs. Angela was beginning to fix that, reminding me what it was like to have someone to be interesting in and who was interested in you.

As I walked through the town people looked at me with rather befuddled expressions, the most confused faces I'd seen since I first moved into the town. It was probably due to a mixture of things. My white pants were wrinkled from being slept in. I wasn't wearing a cloak since I hadn't bothered to put one on before rushing out of the house the night before. Maybe though, just maybe, it was because I smiled faintly as I strolled back to my house rather than wearing an expression of utter disinterest for the world.

When I was settled at my desk I found myself unable to work because of the thoughts that invaded the silence of my mind. All thoughts of advancements on the concentration crystals and I decided to do the only thing I thought would give me peace of mind, if only for a little while.

Shoving my work to the other side of the desk, I pulled out a quill and several sheets of clean parchment, which was hard to get ahold of but still my favorite to work with. I dipped my quill into the inkwell and began to write in the old-fashioned calligraphy I reserved for writing I would allow others to read. The long, swirling letters flowed across the page as though the ink was pouring directly from my soul. After some time I had written a letter to Angela that I felt would accurately describe my feelings to her. I folded it in onto itself to make its own envelope, like we all used to do when envelopes were a waste of paper, then sealed it with my own crest from my ancient wax seal and wrote her name in a wild flourish across the front. I felt a little nostalgic as I sealed the letter since the crest and the stamp itself were given to me by my Master. It was a downward pointed triangle with a snake inside that I always stamped in dark blue sealing wax.

I walked to the door of my home, the letter held gingerly in my hand, and smiled as I opened the door. Lifting the letter up in front of me, I blew on it and it flew down the street and around the corner into the mailbox at the town hall. I watched the precious piece of paper fluttering in the soft breeze of the summer as my magic guided it to its destination and then turned back into my home to return to work.

* * *

Dearest Angela,

I hope this letter finds you well. I'd like to thank you for all the things you have given to me over these past months. Thank you for joining me in watching the stars and enjoying the stardust. Thank you for sharing coffee and conversation with me. Thank you for accepting me despite all of my deficiencies.

Since I met you I've changed considerably from the hermit I had become. You remind me of the person that I was a very long time ago. I have begun to care about the world again, because of you. I sincerely hope that you enjoy my presence as much as I enjoy yours.

Thank you again and best of wishes,

-Wizard

* * *

**Author's Note:** Please **review** this story. Any input at all, including comments about misspelled words or incorrect grammar and especially praise or constructive criticism, is welcome. I really do want you to speak your mind! Since summer has started my updates should be fairly frequent, there should be an update at least once every two weeks or I'm slacking off. Thank you for reading.

Two chapters in a week though? I'm on a roll, hah. In case you were wondering, this ( image-server/v1/designs/11767633,width=178,height= ) is about how I imagined the Wizard's insignia to look, except pointing downward of course. Sorry this chapter is a bit short than the last one. I think it kind of leaves a bit to be desired as well. If you have any suggestions on improving the story I would truly appreciate them. I hope you've enjoyed the chapter.


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